Weekly Weather: Spring break at the beach less than ideal

Good morning and welcome to my weekly weather report on the immediate past, present and future of weather in the Bayou City.

PAST

Hey kids, welcome to spring break!

It’s a great time of year to take a break from school, hop in the car and head for the beach for some fun and sun, and splashing in the waves.

Only wait a second. It’s kind of been a cold winter. Let’s check those water temperatures, shall we?

Uh-oh, according to the National Weather Service the temperatures off of Galveston Island are 52 degrees, a full 10 degrees colder than last year at this time, and the coldest they’ve been since at least the 1990s.

(National Weather Service)

At that temperature hypothermia is a real concern, with unconsciousness setting in within about one hour.

Of course the reason the water’s so cold is because we’ve had such a cold winter. From the period of Nov. 1 through March 5, the city of Houston had an average temperature of 53.1 degrees, which is nearly four degrees below normal, and ranks as the ninth coldest such period on record.

Whereas Galveston would normally have about nine days during the winter with high temperatures at or below 50 degrees, this year it had 22.

Anyway, let’s do the numbers for last week.

Date

High Temp.

Low Temp.

Average

Departure

Rainfall

Monday

42

27

35

-25

0.03

Tuesday

38

31

35

-25

1.03

Wednesday

53

37

45

-15

0.02

Thursday

61

44

53

-7

0.00

Friday

66

37

52

-9

0.00

Saturday

69

51

60

-1

0.11

Sunday

58

46

52

-9

0.43

Average

55.3

39.0

47.4

-13.0

1.62 (tot.)

Crazy cold for early March, eh?

PRESENT

It will be warmer today, with a mostly cloudy and more humid day as the onshore flow from the Gulf of Mexico resumes.

The question is how much rain an upper-level disturbance, moving in from the west, this afternoon and evening, will produce. Rain chances appear to be much higher along the coast, as can be seen in this accumulation map, which shows totals through Wednesday morning.

(National Weather Service)

Basically if you live south of Interstate 10 your rain chances are much higher.

Tuesday will be another warmer day, with highs in the mid-70s, before a cold front moves through Wednesday morning. This should keep daytime temperatures in the 60s, and push overnight lows on Thursday morning to around 40 degrees.

But we should see a nice warm-up heading into the weekend, with a slight chance of rain on Saturday and possibly some thunderstorm activity later on Sunday. We’ll have to watch for that possibility.

FUTURE

Is it going to get really cold again, as in freeze?

It’s always possible, but the average date of the last freeze at Hobby Airport was a month ago, and for Bush Intercontinental Airport it was a week ago.

There’s nothing close to a freeze in the forecast after this week’s cold front, and I very much doubt temperatures will fall below the upper 30s t0 40 degrees this week.

SUMMARY

My rating scale for this week’s weather goes from 0 to 34, the number of years it’s been since the original “Cosmos” aired. I thought last night’s update of the iconic series was tremendous.

My number: 29.

Finally, if you want several daily updates on weather, please “like” my SciGuy Facebook page. It’s the best place for multiple daily updates on our weather, delivered right to your news feed.

FINE PRINT

As always, thank you to the fine professionals at the National Weather Service for the information and data that make this weekly blog entry possible. Also, bear in mind there’s always uncertainty in weather forecasting, particularly the timing and intensity of precipitation.

Don’t care about colleges. Not in about 30 years. Knowing that U of H is closed for spring break won’t affect my morning commute. On the other hand, when HISD and the other biggies close I’ll see a measurable decrease in my commute time.